Itâ€™s a sad reflection of our expectations as consumers that weâ€™re actually surprised when we receive good service or encounter a truly outstanding product. Take the Acer TravelMate 8204WLMi for example. On Thursday when Iâ€™d pretty much finished writing the review, I was trying to decide whether it deserved nine or 10 out of 10. Lars and I sat there scratching our heads trying to think of something that was wrong with the machine in order for it not to get the full complement and an Editorâ€™s Choice award. In the end we both decided that Acer really did have every box ticked and the machine really did deserve the top award.

It must be a sign of the times that we seem to almost expect poor service as consumers, so much so that weâ€™re shocked when weâ€™re treated well. I mention this because I recently found myself pleasantly surprised at the service I received when trying to set up all my kit at home.

Last month I moved house and as such had to say goodbye to my lovely 8Mbit ADSL connection. Unfortunately, being that Iâ€™m now living in a small village in Surrey, 8Mbit broadband wasnâ€™t on the menu and 2Mbit was the best on offer. Now, thereâ€™s no shortage of ISPs to choose from these days and while I was trying to decide who to sign up with an interesting press release landed in my inbox.

As reported here, Eclipse Internet recently announced a free monthâ€™s trial to anyone. Now, this isnâ€™t a â€œsign up for a year and get the first month freeâ€ kind of offer that weâ€™ve seen many times before, what Eclipse was offering was a chance to try out the service for a month with no obligation â€“ if you didnâ€™t want to carry on after that month, you just walked away, owing the company nothing.

A little investigation into Eclipse revealed that the free trial wasnâ€™t the only innovative trick up the companyâ€™s sleeve. Eclipse offers broadband packages called â€œFlexâ€ which allow the user to increase the bandwidth at will for a minimal charge. So, if you feel that a bog standard 512Kbps is fine for you most of the time, but you occasionally need to download large files quickly, you can â€œFlexâ€ your bandwidth up to 2Mbit for a cost of 10p per hour. Also, unlike many of the ISPs these days, all of the Eclipse Flex packages offer unlimited monthly usage allowance.

Deciding to give Eclipse a go, I signed up online for connection at my new home. After finishing the registration process I was able to track my order via the website, and this really impressed me. What I was presented with was a step by step breakdown of the activation process. As my order progressed through each step I was given an estimated time of completion and I was happy to see that every step was completed well before the estimated time.

It was the 21st of December when I signed up and on 22nd I received an email saying my ADSL would be live on the 30th, which was pretty good considering I know people who have had to wait almost a month for broadband activation.

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